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Home Front Economy
Los Angeles officials today will revive a controversial proposal to recycle wastewater
2008-05-16
Highlighting fixed
Lots of things there that you can drink,
But stay away from the kitchen sink.
The breakfast garbage that you throw in to the Bay,
They drink at lunch in San Jose.
So go to the city, see the crazy people there.
Like lambs to the slaughter,
They're drinking the water
And breathing [cough] the air. Tom Lehrer 1965

L.A. prepares massive water-conservation plan

The initiative would punish water wasters and limit such activities as watering lawns and washing vehicles. And it would revive a controversial effort to recycle sewage water.

With vital and often-distant water sources shrinking, Los Angeles officials today will revive a controversial proposal to recycle wastewater as part of a plan to curb usage and move the city toward greater water independence.

The aggressive, multiyear proposal could do much to catch the city up to other Southern California communities that have launched advanced recycling programs.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's effort could cost up to $2 billion and affect a wide range of daily activities. For example, residents would be urged to change their clothes' washers, and new restrictions would be placed on how and when they could water lawns and clean cars.

Financial incentives and building code changes would be used to incorporate high-tech conservation equipment in homes and businesses. Builders would be pushed to install waterless urinals, weather-sensitive sprinkler systems and porous parking lot paving that allows rain to percolate into groundwater supplies.
Posted by:GolfBravoUSMC

#24  Most places that recycle the wastewater at least bother to dilute several hundred times - 200 gallons for fresh for every gallon of wastewater. Either that or they run it through other forms of purification like solar lensing.
Posted by: Shieldwolf   2008-05-16 19:39  

#23  sorry about the typos, was on the phone while typing....Friday afternoons - too worn down to multi-task, apparently
Posted by: Frank G   2008-05-16 19:31  

#22  native San Diegan (one of teh few) - the issue is tertiary treatment capabilities do not screen for viruses or traces of antibiotics, pharmaceuticals. Typical current proces is to depend on dilution via dumping in "clean" water in sufficiently low levels to minimize effects. Taking water directly "toilet-to-tap" without massive (see: Colorado River") dilution is rolling the dice IMHO. Other knowledgables disagree. I welcome them to be the pilot project
Posted by: Frank G   2008-05-16 19:21  

#21  NEWSVINE/SCIENCEDAILY/OTHER > RISE OF SOLYENT GREEN > Proposal to liquify and dissolve human corpses in lye chemical solutions. WHY WASTE A PERFECTLY GOOD HUMAN-BASED/DERIVED CHEMICAL LIQUID VV GLOBAL FOOD CRISES???

D *** NG IT, SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL MARX/SOV-RUHR FRANKEN-SCIENTIST!
Posted by: JosephMendiola   2008-05-16 18:52  

#20  The tipping point has been passed in California, immigration is guaranteed to continue to increase, as is poverty, corruption, graft, excessive taxation, regulatory asphyxiation, and declining quality of life. Wh have imported the latino 3rd world and all it's ills. Governor Villareigo will do nothing but more of the same, and the unions will lockstep even more of government and industry. Have you noted that even the Hollywood liberal establishment is quietly leaving the state, not just the productions but the studio complexes themselves...
then when the state goes boom, the rest of the US will be taxed to prop it up.....for a while, till the Chinese foreclose on all the businesses they are buying.
Time to head for a food producing region and bunker in...
Posted by: NoMoreBS   2008-05-16 16:11  

#19  But then, most of the people who live in California today were NOT born here. They came from places like Colorado, New York, New Jersey, Texas, Iowa, Michigan, Mexico, China, India, Philippines, Vietnam, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, etc. California is the Ellis Island of the Pacific, the Ellis Island of the 21st Century and on a scale far more massive Lady Liberty ever dreamed of. If this is the US government's immigration policy I think it's only fair that some of the other states should take some too. Look at a map of the United States. It's a big, big country and they can't all live in this little corner of it. Consider this, too, when Ellis Island was in it's heyday the US was a young country with vast resources and uninhabited territories. It's not that way anymore. In fact, there are those of us who think we've had quite enough already. So either change this country's immigration policy or get used a lot more Californication.
Posted by: Abu Uluque   2008-05-16 14:10  

#18  Do the millions of illegal aliens in California use water? /snark
Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC   2008-05-16 14:09  

#17  I don't see a real problem here, Don't all Caliphornians drink bottled water from Far, Far away.(Yep Snark)
Posted by: Redneck Jim   2008-05-16 14:06  

#16  All Calif. has to do is bite the bullet (due to the semi-unreliable water supply), to construct a series of desalinization plants that are kicked in when snow melt, and rainfall do not meet needs.

It is expensive, but the state sits astride the Pacific Ocean.
Posted by: Bertie Thineling 650   2008-05-16 13:59  

#15  Ouch, OldSpook. The truth hurts.
Posted by: Abu Uluque   2008-05-16 13:56  

#14  Yeah, Im seeing that here in Colorado. Its certianly not the Colorado I knew when I was at Fort Carson and Buckley ANG (now Airforce) Base.

The inmates in Denver and Boulder are now running the nuthouse State House, and the morons from CA that moved here to get away from overbearing laws, pollution and insane real estate are now recreating those very same things.

Locusts.
Posted by: OldSpook   2008-05-16 13:19  

#13  gotta love how all this adds to the cost of doing business, thus driving even more of it away from CA> Overbearing government and overpopulation are a self-solving system.

Yeah, but unfortunately, instead of learning a lesson, they simply immigrate to other states and screw them up. AKA Californication.
Posted by: charger   2008-05-16 13:00  

#12  It's Chinatown.

Exactly right, Excalibur. Watch the movie Chinatown. It's the whole story in one very depressing movie. Corruption and depravity are what it's all about. You take the most beautiful little girl in the world, you teach her to smoke and drink and then you rape her...it is the story of California. Roman Polansky knew too much about it but at least he got the movie right.
Posted by: Abu Uluque   2008-05-16 12:24  

#11  There is talk in the climate forums that conditions could be right for a return of mega-drought to California.

Link
Posted by: phil_b   2008-05-16 12:04  

#10  It's sad for Caliphornia. Just another rung down the ladder. Like every other thing there, the populace never considers that things can get worse, not continually better. This water would be ideal as mentioned, for watering golf courses, etc. But, that would require another set of piping which costs big bucks, which Caliphornia also doe not have. Arnie now wants to borrow against future lottery receipts. What a joke. No one can guarantee future lottery revenue. So, the fallback position by the Mexican commies in the legislature is a raise in the general sales tax. Bet on it.
Posted by: Woozle Elmeter 2700   2008-05-16 11:56  

#9  It's Chinatown.
Posted by: Excalibur   2008-05-16 10:22  

#8  #2. Couldn't they just use it for industrial water needs? Drinking it sounds a little iffy to me.

#3. Not in Caliphornia. It makes the water more palatable for the illegals.

LMAO!, I just cleaned the floor up too!
Posted by: RD   2008-05-16 09:49  

#7  gotta love how all this adds to the cost of doing business, thus driving even more of it away from CA> Overbearing government and overpopulation are a self-solving system.
Posted by: OldSpook   2008-05-16 09:46  

#6  It's the invisible hand of commerce saying "you've put too damn many people in place that can't sustain them". Adding the loose population of Mexico ain't helping. Next thing you know you'll end up as recycle for the Fremen water conservation program.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2008-05-16 09:34  

#5  Lots of other places in the West have been using treated effluent for years.

The biggest problem with it is an odd one, a buildup of phosphates, that while not harmful in itself, act as fertilizer for microorganisms. So when it is warm out, open water has a lot more algae growth.

The phosphates come mostly from dishwasher detergent, which avoided the laundry detergent prohibition back in the 1960s, and from city PVC pipe glue, which bleeds a lot of phosphates into the water.

Effluent also tends to concentrate salts, like arsenic, so special care needs to be taken to reduce their levels on a regular basis.
Posted by: Anonymoose   2008-05-16 09:13  

#4  A lot of hand-wringing over nothing. Where do you think your toilet water goes? Back in to the rivers, streams and ocean where it is 'treated' by mother nature and sent back in to the system. If the technology is sound, there is no difference, they would just be using technology to speed up the natural process. Nothing to see here...
Posted by: AllahHateMe   2008-05-16 08:55  

#3  Not in Caliphornia. It makes the water more palatable for the illegals.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2008-05-16 08:34  

#2  California agencies are also recycling treated sewage water back into the drinking supply.

Couldn't they just use it for industrial water needs? Drinking it sounds a little iffy to me.
Posted by: Omeretle Guelph2746   2008-05-16 08:27  

#1  Sorry about that, highlight end got lost in the shuffle. Should be after Tom Lehrer 1965.
Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC   2008-05-16 06:26  

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